Along the lines of paying attention…I saw this saying on a picture in a high school counselor’s office recently and it, well, just resonated with me:
Pay attention to your thoughts, because they become your words.
Pay attention to your words, because they become your actions.
Pay attention to your actions, because they become your habits.
Pay attention to your habits, because they become your character.
Pay attention to your character, because it becomes your destiny.
I’m not sure why I’m putting it in the “parenting” section. Maybe it’s just because I saw it in our son’s high school guidance counselor’s office while we...

I’ve written before on Dove’s Self-Esteem project and the creative videos they have produced inviting us to examine our notions of beauty. This movement isn’t without its critics. And, indeed, we need to think critically and carefully about a campaign related to beauty sponsored by a company (Unilever) that sells hygiene and beauty products. At the same time, even as we offer critical feedback, we need, I think, to take seriously the underlying concerns Unilever is unearthing and responses they are suggesting.
Which brings me to this very well done – and for this reason also troubling and inspiring – TED Talk by Meaghan Ramsey,...

What is the difference between love and acceptance? Between disease and personality? Between difference and identity? Andrew Solomon takes up these and other questions in this moving talk on the challenges that face parents of extraordinary children – extraordinarily different, bright, difficult, and more. But as you listen, you’ll realize he is speaking about all parents, all whose destiny is held captive by the fate and fortunes of their children.
Based on the research and interviews he conducted for this remarkable book Far From the Tree: Parents, Children and the Search for Identity, Solomon challenges us to reconsider the ideals we...

“You can do this yourself.”
These were the five words I most disliked hearing from my parents. Oh, I know, you can probably think of five worse words to hear. But these words meant that something I had asked them to do for me got turned around into something I had to do for myself.
And that, obviously, wasn’t what I wanted. If I had wanted to do it myself, I wouldn’t have asked them to do it in the first place! Like calling a coach to ask why I wasn’t playing as much as I thought I should be. Or settling an argument with a sibling. Or asking someone for a job.
The very point of my asking is that these were things that...

Ask most parents what they most hope for their child, and one of the immediate answers will be that we want our children to be happy. Sometimes that’s intensified, as in, “While I hope they find a good job and lead a good life, all I really want is for my child is happy.” That goal and desire, as Jennifer Senior explains, is so ingrained in current parenting culture that we don’t even question it. But maybe we should.
Just as we were willing to ask whether happiness is a goal or a by-product, so also might we question what the primary role, responsibility and goal of parenting is. Because if you believe that...

Parents do a lot of things. We try to teach our children values. We provide them with home, clothing, education, and more. We protect them whenever necessary and possible and – often much harder – try to let them to struggle when that seems more important. And, of course and most importantly, we love them…deeply, truly, more than they will ever know until they have children of their own.
But I wonder if another thing we do – whether we know it or not – is also frame the world for them, provide them with a sense of what is possible and real, and prepare them to accept — or reject — the terms of the world in which they...

Just about a year ago I wrote a post that suggested that in many ways, it’s harder than ever to be a mom. This isn’t to underestimate the effort most dads make to share more of the work at home; it’s simply to recognize that today’s moms not only balance responsibilities at home but...

As indicated by my post last week on “Grit,” I think this is one of the most important and challenging elements of parenting. Important because if our kids don’t learn to persevere when things get really challenging, if they don’t learn resiliency in the face of set backs, and if they don’t learn that they’ve got more in them than they thought, it’s going to be really, really hard for them to flourish as adults. Why? Simply because life is full of setbacks, we all suffer low moments, and some of the most important situations we’ll be in – parenting, marriage, etc. – require us to give more than we’d imagined we had.
But...

I saw this video a few weeks ago and loved it. But I also hesitated to put it on my blog. It’s another video of Louis C.K., the comedian who I think is a very astute student of human nature and our culture. It’s on his hesitancy to give his kids cell phones. While naming some of the detrimental social conditioning he thinks cell phones promote – not making eye contact, always looking down – he goes beyond that to talk about the ways in which we us our phones to avoid sadness. Rather than feel sad, we look for something meaningless to do, like sending a text. In fact, Louis believes there’s a value to feeling sad, a value to...

Somewhere along the way, most of us bought into the notion that ability is central to success. You know what I mean, “he’s a natural musician,” or “she was born an athlete.”
More recently, that assumption has been challenged on numerous grounds. Far more important than ability, it...

Fred Rogers was a regular and important part of my childhood and continues, well after his death, to continue to serve as an inspiration. Recently the Huffington Post re-ran a picture of “Mr. Rogers” with some advice his mother gave him on how to cope with tragedy. Many have found it helpful as they think about how to talk with their children about tragedy. Typical of his style, the advice is simple, practical, and clear:
When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” To this day, especially in times of ‘disaster,’...

Robert Krulwich, NPR’s science correspondent, recently posted on his blog the story of a remarkable nine-year old boy who gets dubbed “the philosopher” for his views on the world, the universe, the question of free will and destiny, and more, all in just a few minutes.
Except, as Krulwich explains via his interview of the film’s maker, the boy isn’t that unusual. Bright, yes; extraordinary, probably not. Except perhaps in this: his parents have gotten into the habit of asking him profound questions and taking seriously his answers. His parents, in other words, trust his ability to think, to reason, to wonder, and to offer his...